Twenty-Four
by cheertennis12
Summary: "Maybe you'd just confessed to Holden everything you'd been scared to admit to yourself, and it had taken a teenager with a gun pointed at your head to finally make you accept who Nick was and exactly what you were to him." Rollaro, post Holden's Manifesto, STORY 1 OF SERIES
1. Chapter 1

**So, this is WAY different from my typical third person Bensidy, but I decided to try a little something new. I know this has been done quite a few times, but I hope this is unique enough to still be enjoyable. I might leave it here as a one shot, I might finish up with one more chapter... opinions welcome :)**

**To keep it as easy as possible, in addition to the headers, Amanda's POV is regular font, Nick's POV is italicized. **

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><p><strong>AMANDA<strong>

It had barely been twenty-four hours.

He had called you and texted you all day, but you just needed time to think. Olivia had insisted you take the day off, you would reconvene and submit to your mandatory psych evaluation on Wednesday, and although you knew it was partially because she had enough on her plate with Noah and she didn't want to deal with you yet, you were in no shape to argue.

You saw the look that he gave you; it was uncomfortably familiar. Out of the corner of your eye, you had seen it six months ago, when Nick had swooped in to rescue yet another blood-splattered damsel in distress. He'd looked at Olivia that same pitiful way, and he sure as hell wasn't sleeping with her. Or was he? You don't know anything anymore, and you feel a little ridiculous that a nineteen-year-old psychopath is making you question everything you know.

And so, you'd spent the last twenty-four hours curled up on the couch with your Frannie girl and a bottle of wine and attempted to drown out the screaming of your own thoughts and the rising temptation to let loose and throw your recovery away.

You had told Holden the truth, kind of. Nick was the type of guy you'd gone for in your younger days, the kind of guy who always left you feeling hurt and used and empty. Maybe you'd just confessed to Holden everything you'd been scared to admit to yourself, and it had taken a teenager with a gun pointed at your head to finally make you accept who Nick was and exactly what you were to him. He was the hot shot who could get any girl he wanted, but settled for _you_ because you were easy and available, with little bit of loneliness and desperation hidden under the surface. Nick had never answered Holden's question; what was he so intent on hiding from you that he wouldn't confess even with a gun to his head?

You'd fallen for believing that you were something special to him. Nick Amaro had played you, and you were the fool, and damn it all.

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><p><strong>NICK<strong>

_You approach the door of apartment 4D and press your ear to the cold metal. The low hum of the TV fills the room, and you can vaguely hear a woman inside cooing at her four-legged companion._

_"Amanda," You call, rapping on the door with your knuckles. The chatter inside stopped. "Amanda!" You call a little louder with a more forceful knock. You listen in anticipation for footsteps to approach the door, but nothing._

_"Amanda, come on. It's Nick. Open up." You call with involuntary desperation this time. Sure enough, a door creaked open, but it belonged to the unit across the hall. A gray-headed woman poked her head out into the hallway._

_Quickly whipping out your badge, you flash the shiny metal at the onlooker. "Sorry, ma'am. Detective Rollins and I work together; She had a hard day. I just came by to check on her." You pray that the woman will buy your "concerned coworker" explanation and doesn't know enough to connect you as the man who has been entertained at Amanda's apartment at all hours of the night for the past six months. To your relief, she offers a sympathetic nod and retreats back inside. You pull up your bootstraps and go back to your persistence._

_"Please, 'Manda… You're giving Holden exactly what he wanted. You can't listen to him; Don't let him get inside your head." Once again, your words come out with building desperation, and you hate yourself a little bit for it. You sink to the ground beside the door and rest your head against the 1960's cinderblock that framed the walls of her aged apartment building._

_"Don't let him win, Amanda." You murmur with a dejected sigh._

_A few moments pass. You'd almost given up when you hear the door quietly unlatch and the chain slink out of its fastener. You quickly scramble to your feet and smooth the wrinkles out of your shirt and wait. "'Manda?" You call, this time out of curiosity. When she still fails to respond, you decide to take the gamble. Slowly, you wrap your hand around the doorknob and push it open._

_Frannie bounds over to greet you, her excitement nearly knocking you to the floor. You're thankful for the icebreaker. "Hey girl." You chuckle, squatting down and furiously scratching behind her ears. She plants a slobbery kiss square on your mouth, and you recoil, still laughing. "I've missed you too." You stretch out a hand to block her tongue from any further contact with your mouth. They always say that a dog's mouth is cleaner than a human's, but you're still skeptical._

_The carefree moment was quickly broken when you raise your head and your eyes meet her icy blues._

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><p><em><strong>AMANDA<strong>_

"Hey." He says softly, and it's a little reassuring to know that he looks as uncomfortable as you feel.

"Hey." You whisper back, gripping the kitchen counter so tightly that your knuckles turned translucent and fighting the urge to run. If this wasn't your apartment, and he wasn't blocking your escape route, you'd be out of here faster than he could blink, because he's the last person you want to see right now.

"How are you doing, 'Manda?" He shoves his hands in his pockets and shuffles his feet, but his eyes still bore into you and it's too much. The moment you look away, your mind fills with the replay of a gunshot and blood splatter and you have no choice but to look back at him. It's still the lesser of the two evils.

"I'm fine, okay?" You offer an exasperated sigh and try to present yourself with as composed of a front as you can muster only twenty fours after being a hostage, and having a gun pointed at your head, and telling a nineteen year old half-truths about your boyfriend(?) that were now making you question everything. "I went to a meeting this afternoon, then Fin came by, and Olivia's already called me, and I told them both, I'm okay." It's all a lie, and you're sure he knows it. You haven't left your apartment since Fin dropped you off yesterday afternoon, and although it's true that Olivia and your partner have both tried to contact you numerous times, you haven't reciprocated much effort, offering them both simple texts about how you were still alive and you hadn't fallen off the wagon quite yet.

He takes a bold step closer and you clench your eyes shut to brace yourself.

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><p><strong>NICK<strong>

_The tension that had dissipated after your first night together was now back with a vengeance, and you wonder how you ever got here. You never expected for this to happen. You'd worked with her for three years, during which your marriage had crumbled and your life had been turned upside down, and her life had been just as unstable. Months of personal and professional tension had culminated in one passion filled night after Maria had turned your attempts at reconciliation down, case involving a runaway from New Jersey, and one too many beers. You'd had your fun, then she'd shut you out, then you'd shut her out, and it continued back and forth like a game of ping-pong whenever one of you had a new battle with your personal demons. But somehow, you always came back to each other, and you were still here._

_You think you love her, but you're not really sure. You thought you loved your high school girlfriend, and Cynthia, and Maria. Every single relationship you'd ever engaged in had gone up in flames and you just don't know if love means anything anymore. But you'd begun to feel something different for Amanda, and it's intriguing._

_Twenty-four hours ago, you never thought you would both stand here together ever again. Leaving her alone with Holden was one of the hardest things you've ever had to do. You'd heard the gun go off, and in that moment, it was if your world had stopped turning. You'd taken off before you even had a chance to look at the camera and see who was on the other end of the barrel. You were the first one in the room and your heart nearly fluttered out of your chest when you saw her standing there. Alive. And then you'd made yourself a promise, that you would tell her everything you'd left unsaid for the last six months. You'd escort her out of that classroom, and you'd hold her, and you wouldn't care who saw or who knew. But she'd never given you that chance, nearly shoving you away when you'd made a move to comfort her._

_"I'm, uh, glad you're okay." You offer, because you don't know what else to say. She looks at you, but doesn't speak, and once again, you're caught in this predicament where your words seem like too much and not enough. You don't know what she believes, and you don't know how you can change her mind once it's made up. She's a stubborn little thing._

_"Yeah." She finally whispers back, ducking her eyes. You realize that if you're going to get anywhere, it's not going to happen by you being passive._

_"'Manda, come on. Talk to me." You stand up a little straighter._

_"You know what… Nick… It's okay. It's okay." She relinquishes her death grip on the counter and starts this talking-with-her-hands thing that you've come to learn she does when she's trying to settle a point she might not quite believe herself. "You don't have to explain anything. This… us… we're just having fun, right? No strings attached." She half shrugs, and you can see the tears in her eyes._

_When you realize she's still not going to hear a word you say, you resort to the one surefire way to get her attention. You don't know what exactly happened in that classroom after she all but threw you out to lead four terrified teenagers to safety, but whatever it was, it turned her from gently cuffing you to a cabinet to shoving you off when you rushed in to her after Holden was taken down. Whatever she'd said to identify with Holden, whatever Holden had said to convince her that Nick was the bad guy, it had gotten to her._

_"Four." You say solemnly._

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><p><strong>AMANDA<strong>

"Four?" You know exactly what he means, and you risk sounding like an idiot by repeating his answer, just to make sure you heard him correctly. Maybe he said twenty-four, even forty. Damn your voice for cracking in the process. A guy like Nick… smooth, ambitious, attractive… who's had two children by two different woman, and his number is still only a fraction of the remnants from your fast-and-loose days in college, and now the guilt begins to creep in as he continues to explain.

"I was with the same girl from high school all the way through my first few years on the force. She was my first. We were seventeen." He preemptively addresses the other question he knows is looming in your mind. "I ah, caught her with my best friend a month before we were supposed to get married. I took a UC assignment to get away after that, and you know about Cynthia. Then Maria… That's it. You're not… I mean. Sex isn't something I've ever taken lightly. Not with anyone, and not with you."

_But you have._ Then you moved to the City and didn't, then Nate happened, then you saw something in Nick, and you didn't, then for twenty-four hours you did again, and now you're so confused because maybe you're the only one who's guilty of your own silent accusations. You open our mouth and close it again and look at him like you're an idiot, and you silently beg him to talk so you don't have to.

"I don't know what you think this is, but you're more than just a notch in my belt." He takes a step closer to you until he nearly has you pinned against the kitchen counter. It's true that you've never really sat down to have the classic D.T.R. discussion. You've spent most of your time together out of breath and tangled in sheets, and then trying to play it cool in public, which wasn't always easy surrounded by New York's most perceptive detectives.

He reaches up to brush your hair out of your face, and you instinctively nuzzle his hand before you even realize what you're doing. He looks surprised, just as you would expect, because you know you're putting your acquired expertise at sending mixed signals to good use right now. You're still not sure if you love him or if you hate him or if you trust him.

"Why did you let them kill him?" Your voice is shaky, but you finally find the traction to speak, and once you start, you can't stop. "Didn't you trust me?! Didn't you tell them I had it under control. Two more minutes and we both would have walked out of there!"

"He was coming towards you… "

"I told him to! I told him to kiss me!" You shriek in a way that surprises yourself, and damn it, Nick probably thinks you're an unstable twit at this point. Even if this means the end of your screwing days, you do have save face because after the dust settles, he's still going to be your coworker. This is why they always say not to sleep with your coworker

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><p><strong>NICK<strong>

_The thought of that bastard kissing your girl makes you want to vomit._

_"We fought for you. Benson and I both did. We told Dodds to give you time; It wasn't our call. I'm sorry, 'Manda. But I'm glad he didn't get the chance to kiss you." You tell her._

_"What does it matter?" She crosses her arms and mutters_

_"Because I'm jealous. I want to be the only one kissing you." It's the honest truth, and a smile creeps across your face as you think about the feel of her lips on yours._

_She looks back at you, bewildered. You're feeling brave now, so you slowly lean in closer, giving her every chance to pull away if she wants. She doesn't. So you kiss her, just long enough to whet your appetite._

_"Nick…"_

_"Tell me you don't want this." You challenge, and she doesn't. _

_So you kiss her again._

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><p><strong>Thanks for reading... don't forget to leave a review!<strong>


	2. Chapter 2

**AMANDA**

To say _'he kissed you'_ is probably not a fair statement, because it would be a boldfaced lie to say you weren't an equally willing participant. He'd thrown you off at first; you weren't expecting it when he leaned in and gave you a quick peck on the lips. He'd given you every chance to fight and you didn't. You didn't want to.

Now his tongue swirls against yours and you snake an arm around his waist as his hand reaches around to pull you tightly against him. He kisses you like it's been much, much longer than twenty-four hours since you last swapped spit behind the conveniently tinted windows of your squad car. This feels _good, _and you want to forget, and it almost makes you. But then you have to come up for air.

And now you're out of breath, inches away from his face and feeling his haggard breath warm against your own. He looks at you with such care and tenderness and admiration and dare you even consider the word love because you're not sure you've ever even loved yourself. An alarming dose of reality begins to creep in – Nick has only slept with _three other women_, each of them in a serious and committed relationship. Relationships with weddings and babies and futures, and you don't know if that will ever be who you are_._

You long for the underappreciated days where your prior escapades were just gray areas in the eye of the beholder. When he was just a boy, and you were just a girl, and you could think whatever you needed to fall asleep beside him at night instead of knowing he's an oblivious choir boy and you're…. you. You functioned best in blissful ignorance.

Here you are, lucky number four. You don't do serious, and you don't do commitment, and just ten minutes ago, you were distressed over the idea of Nick using you as another notch in his belt. Now, you're here wondering what Nick sees in _you _because he deserves so much more than the girl who easily topped that number in a single semester of college. You're not a slut, you're not a whore, you're just a little bit broken.

So you begin to panic, because in the middle of your unprocessed uncertainty he _kissed_ you, and damn it, mister, this is _not _helping right now.

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><p><strong>NICK<strong>

_You've always said, if someone would publish a Hitchhiker's Guide to the Female Mind, you'd be a more than willing investor. Your mother, your cheating ex-fiancé, your ink-still-wet-on-the-paper ex-wife, the mother of your son, your daughter, your boss… you're perpetually outnumbered by the double X chromosome. The drama, and the complex infrastructure of the female mind, and the fluctuating hormones will probably be the death of you someday. _

_Amanda, though… she's different. You can't really put a finger on it, but you have something with her that you've never had before. She'd been teaching you how to loosen up and have fun long before you took it to the bedroom. Every relationship you've had has been serious and driven and structured, and it's left you with two amazing kids, but once again filing your tax returns as a single man. Maybe it's time for a change, and you're intrigued by the comparative lightheartedness you've found with Amanda. She was easy, not in promiscuous way, but you could talk to her in a way you never could with Callie, or Cynthia, or Maria. There was no pressure. You hope she knows you like everything about this except the secrecy it requires. _

_Now, you lift your head to train your attention on Amanda, and as soon as she feels your eyes bearing down on her, she quickly squirms out of your embrace. You scan her up and down, looking for cues as to why she's gone from standoffish, to rational, to a more than willing participant in your liplock, to whatever this is right now. _

_"__Hey. Amanda…." You start out, and she frowns at you. You reach a hand out to reconnect with her and she frantically swats you away. Okay. Smooth move, Amaro. _

_"__Stop it. Just… stop it. I'm fine" She's talking with her hands again, and you know she's not fine. You can see the little nuances in her body language; hear the wavering in her voice. All you want is to wrap her tightly in your arms and reassure her that this is okay and she's okay and you're okay, but you've worked SVU long enough to be hyper vigilant when a woman tells you to stop. _

_So, you bury your hands in your pocket to fight the growing temptation for physical touch. "You don't look fine," you say with a half shrug. _

_She bites her lip and looks away. "What are we doing here, Nick?" _

_You feel like everything good in your life is about to slip away because of a lie._

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><p><strong>AMANDA<strong>

You realize something now. _You're that girl._ You're the girl that Holden was talking about that broke the heart of nice guys everywhere. The pretty blonde who misses what's standing right in front of her to go for the jerks who leave you feeling used and abused. Once again, you chide yourself for gleaning your epiphanies from a nineteen-year-old psychopath, but you can't ignore the truth buried within.

Holden had talked about those girls, your type, _giving sex to men who do not love you or who use your bodies_, and it was as if he was talking straight to you. _You throw yourself at men who are mean and selfish, _and oh boy, haven't you.

You'd told Holden a lie, though. Nick _isn't_ the kind of guy you used to like. This was uncharted territory for you. He's not like Nate, or your captain in Atlanta, or any of the boys who had paraded in and out of your bedroom since your freshman year of high school.

But Holden had Nick all wrong. He wasn't the macho guy he was accused of being, the kind of guy you had briefly let Holden convince you he was. Nick was a nice guy. He was smart and clean. He was well dressed, save for those lazy weekends you spent together that had him lounging at one of your apartments in ragged sweatpants and a t-shirt with enough holes to be mistaken for a slice of Swiss cheese. He took care of himself about as well as you could when you were working a case for three days straight and rotating naptime in the cribs. He took care of _you_. He was gentle. He was everything Holden thought he was and wanted to be.

He was everything you wanted, and he deserved to know the truth. You've got to tell him, and if he cares for you like you want him to, it won't matter to him. Who you've been isn't who you are.

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><p><strong>NICK<strong>

_Although you don't understand it, you certainly don't complain when she grabs your hand and leads you the few steps to her couch. You follow her lead, eventually settling against the cushioned arm as she takes a seat opposite you. _

_"__I'm sorry." She whispers after awhile, and you can't figure out for the life of you why she would need to apologize. Having a psychopath's blood splattered against your face seems like it should be a free pass from any necessary apology in the aftermath. At least, you want to give her that grace in any situation between the two of you, but she doesn't seem to feel the same. _

_"__I'm like the girls Holden was talking about. I've made a lot of mistakes, and… a lot of boys." She offers something between a sigh and a chuckle and a sob, and she shakes her head slowly. "You're a good man, Nick. And that's not who I want to be anymore, but I need to make sure you know what you're getting in to with me… if this is really what you want. I definitely have some baggage, and I don't want you to take it unless you're sure."_

_She doesn't give you the specifics, and you don't need to ask for numbers and names. What she told you, you already knew. You'd seen the ups and downs of the last three years. You watched her make the mistakes you tried your hardest to protect her from with that little twerp, Nate. You'd heard her clam up whenever the squad's conversation diverted to a discussion of her old precinct in Atlanta. You knew enough, and the only thing you cared about in the situation was the girl. _

_And now, it hits you that, by inadvertently pulling the choirboy card in an attempt to reassure her of your fidelity, it had backfired into bringing up her own insecurities about her past. You mentally kick yourself for it. _

_"__Hey, we've all done things we wish we hadn't. But it makes us who we are, y'know? All that matters to me is that we're here now." For a millisecond, you consider using the L word but decide not to throw in another element of confusion right now. You'll save that for later, because now the hope has returned that there actually will be a later. You settle for a less daunting display of affection. "I don't care about what you've done. I care about you, Amanda. Don't listen to anything Holden said. I'm not goin' anywhere. Do you trust me?"_

_She nods her understanding, tearing up in the process. _

_"__Can I kiss you?" This time, you ask for her express permission. You want her to know that you're not like any of those guys who have chewed her up and spit her out without a second thought. _

_She smiles and beats you to it._

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><p><strong>AMANDA<strong>

"Is it that obvious?" You've conceded now. You're fully curled up on the couch against him and for the first time in twenty-four hours, Holden isn't the man on your mind. One of Nick's hands tangles in your messy bun and the other five fingers dance over your upper arm. You could get used to this, and it scares you because you're still not convinced you should.

"What?"

"This. You and me. Holden knew we've been…" You intentionally keep it in past tense, and trail off because, as you've already established, _this _isn't titled. Dating? Hooking up? In a relationship? Screwing? Whatever. "If he could figure it out so easily, do you think Fin knows? Or Liv?" You almost use this as a test, because you know he and Olivia are close, and sometimes you worry that if she were to find out and disapprove of his choice of _you, _that'd be the end of it.

Olivia is great; _everyone loves Olivia_, you find yourself thinking in a singsong kind of way. But she takes on a special role with you, one of a sanctimonious bitch, but you know you usually have a knack for provoking it. You're torn between hating her and wanting to be her, minus the mommy issues, and the daddy issues, and the laughably disastrous love life, and especially the whole crazed psychopath's blood splattered all over the face thing. On second thought, you're two peas in a pod of misfortune.

Mostly, you'd just settle for a little more 'atta girl, Rollins' and a little less condescension.

Nick shrugs. "If they do, they haven't said anything. Liv's so caught up with Noah, I doubt it. All I know about Fin is that he would have my ass if I did anything to hurt you… which I don't plan to do." He quickly added, and you smile. "Do you want to tell them?"

You sigh, because really, you don't. It could mean that one of you would have to leave a job you love, and you aren't sure if you're ready for that level of commitment when your romanticism of him has been shattered and brought back to the process of shaky rebuilding all in the last twenty four hours.

"I'm not going anywhere." He reassures you again.

This time, you believe him.

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><p><strong>AN: Thanks again for reading, guys! I would appreciate and any all feedback you have.**

**This is the end of this little saga, but keep an eye out for more Rollaro shorts in the future, because I've had a lot of fun writing this!**


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